Compelling commentary on children's health

It seems more and more children are appearing in sushi
establishments.But is sushi safe
for children?And when can you
feel good about offering your little bundle of joy a raw wedge of tuna? Great question because the Internet is
teeming with vague, unsubstantiated information on sushi safety.And perhaps for good reason: there’s no
committee-established consensus on the issue.

When making decisions about fish and your child, just look
at it like any other food but with a couple of very important caveats. Consider
three fish factors:Allergy,
safety of preparation, and environmental contamination.Lets take one at a time

Allergy – Concerns over fish allergy should vary depending
upon your family’s allergy history.If there is no history of food
allergy, it’s fair game to offer your child fish once on table food.Offer cooked fish before venturing into
sushi.If there is a family history of fish allergy, introduction
should be withheld until after three years of age and with the approval of your
pediatrician or allergist.

Cool side note: a study that published in the Archives of
Disease in Childhood found that babies who start fish before they’re 9
months old have a lower risk of getting eczema and allergy-related skin disease

Safety of preparation – Uncooked food is different from
cooked food in that infectious contamination always has to be considered.When uncooked food sits, bacteria can
grow and pose risks intestinal infection and food poisoning.Assuming that sushi is fresh, properly
handled and prepared correctly, contamination risk should be minimal.Look for high volume, reputable
establishments.When it comes to
fish, high turnover is a good thing.Oh, and when serving fish to a young child inspect carefully for bones.

Contamination – Arguably the most concerning risk to young
children when it comes to fish is mercury exposure.Like most toxins, remember that it’s difficult to avoid
mercury entirely – all we can do is make every effort to minimize
exposure.The FDA recommends that
you avoid giving young children shark, swordfish, king mackerel and tilefish
because of high mercury levels.Good
‘low mercury’ fish to offer your child (once on table food) include shrimp,
canned light tuna (albacore is higher in mercury), salmon, tilapia, farmed
trout and catfish.

So be it for fashion or taste, sushi represents healthy
alternative for the evolving palate. Just watch your P's & Q's and keep in mind the three fish factors.

So it’s looking like the great U.S. melamine scare of 2008
has appropriately turned out to be a big nothing.If you missed it, the FDA reported small amounts of melamine
in all three of the major formula manufacturers here in the U.S.And if you’ve really had your head in
the sand, melamine is the stuff that Chinese milk suppliers were using to
create the appearance that their milk was better than it was.The result was 50,000 babies with
kidney stones and a few deaths.

So it was true that the FDA found trace amounts of melamine
in U.S. formula but at levels that are barely detectable.To illustrate, this is the equivalent
of one drop of melamine in 64 gallons of infant formula.Or 10,000 times of that seen in the
China scandal.But there’s no
scandal here.As it turns out the
miniscule levels found here were the result of a solution used to clean
manufacturing equipment.Not an
excuse by any means but certainly an explanation that doesn’t suggest scandal
or appreciable risk.This is a
bigger PR problem than a medical problem.

So should parents switch formulas?As an industry-wide finding this wouldn’t appear to make any
sense.Sit tight and recognize
that in the scheme of environmental exposures to lose sleep over, this ranks
twenty or thirty on my list of parental worries.

Should I breast feed?Of course you should breast feed.But not everyone can breast feed and not everyone breastfeeds forever.I’m not able to find any studies on
Pubmed that have evaluated melamine transmission in breast milk.Remember that when it comes to
environmental substances, breast milk isn’t always the solution we wish it
were.What mom gets baby often
gets.Think bisphenol-A,
unfortunately.

While the formula industry has been conspicuously silent on
the issue, I haven’t.You can see
me on Houston’s Fox News Channelhere.

The Corn Refiners Association, known for bringing us high
fructose corn syrup (HFCS), is on the move to buff up the image of this bastard
sweetener.Long felt to be a
contributor to our growing obesity problem, HFCS has been referenced as “the
crack of sweeteners.”You can see
one of the CRA’s YouTube videos here.Propaganda?Look at the
video, read on and make your own decision.

So what’s the scoop?Is HFCS really the evildoer that some would have us believe?Here’s what you need to know:

Processed sugar 101.HFCS is a processed sweetener made from
corn starch and it contains a high level of fructose (found in fruits and
honey) and glucose.HCFS is made
up of about 50 percent fructose and 50 percent glucose, which is about the same
composition of table sugar.While
it may be from corn, HFCS’s refined composition results in remarkably quick
absorption which can impact a child’s insulin levels quickly and
drastically.And this stuff is
everywhere, from ketchup to twinkies.Manufacturers love it because it’s 75% sweeter than sugar, it blends
well into foods and it’s cheap.

HCFS and the obesity
link.The consumption of HFCS
has increased 250% over the past 15 years which has lead some to assume that
HFCS is the core thread in our obesity problem.Further, we consume approximately 300 more calories per day
than we did in 1985.According to
data cited by Michael Pollan in his book, In
Defense of Food, about a quarter of this caloric increase comes from
HFCS.But another quarter come
from fat and about half from grains.So while corn syrup isn’t helping matters, it definitely isn’t operating
alone.Beyond it’s pervasive
presence in just about everything our children eat and it’s propensity for
quick absorption, there’s nothing specific about a HFCS calorie that puts a
child at higher risk for getting fat.

Bottom line.So while HFCS may not
represent an independent threat to our children, it’s the volume of consumption and the
context in which our children consume HFCS that represents a problem.Processed foods high in calories and
fat taken in quantity will put any child at risk for overweight.If you really want to minimize HFCS,
read your labels.But be prepared
to find it everywhere.Your best general
move is to minimize processed foods and offer whole foods whenever possible.

For a little fun check out A Life Less Sweet and follow one family's journey to eliminate HFCS from their world.

The children’s nutrition market in the U.S. is heating up
with Nestle’s introduction of the probiotic Lactobacillus reuteri into their
new pediatric formula, Boost Kid Essentials.Actually the probiotic isn’t in the formula but in the straw
that’s poked into the drink container.With the first sip your child gets 100 million reuteri organisms.Genius.The straw isn’t new, however.It’s been in use for years in Europe – a patented product of
Biogaia AB of Sweden.I posted on
it a year and a half ago and wondered who in the States would be smart enough
to pick up on it.Now we know.

Nestle appears to have the insight to recognize the critical
importance of intestinal microflora in children’s health.More importantly, they’re pioneering
products that allow reliable delivery of study-proven probiotic bugs to the
intestinal tract of our youngest patients.

So how important are bugs to kids?Perhaps the better question to ask is, “How important is
reuteri to kids?” And why would a product like Boost Kid Essentials offer an
advantage to kids who need caloric supplementation?Here are some of the proven benefits of reuteri in kids
(Your mileage, of course, may vary):

Fewer sick days.In a recent study, 181 adult factory
employees were assigned to receive a daily supplement containing either reuteri
or a placebo.The employees were
followed over 80 days and the group taking the reuteri was found to have a 55%
reduction in illness when compared with the placebo group. While this study didn't look at kids, we may be able
to extrapolate the effect to children.

Less diarrhea.A 2005 study compared children in
daycare centers supplemented with reuteri against those without.The children supplemented with reuteri
experienced fewer and shorter episodes of diarrhea.The duration of rotavirus diarrhea in hospitalized babies
has been shown to be diminished in the presence of reuteri.

Inhibits the growth
of numerous nasty organisms.L. reuteri releases a natural inhibitor of bad organisms called
reuterin.And in the test tube
this has been shown to prevent the growth of salmonella, shigella, strep, E.
coli and the ulcer bug, H. pylori among others.

And that’s not all.Reuteri is one of the only probiotic
organisms found to colonize nearly the entire length of the intestinal tract,
not just the colon.It’s also been
identified in breast milk.And
while we would never use a product like Boost Kid Essentials in a baby, it is
reuteri that was found last year to have such dramatic effects at minimizing
misery in screaming babies (“colic” if you’ll pardon the term).And subsequent studies in preemies have
found dramatic effects on upper intestinal motility.Whew! Difficult to explain, perhaps, but nonetheless fascinating.But it just shows that our studies in probiotic use in
children are raising as many questions as they answer.

As you can tell, I love reuteri.

Stay tuned.The
pediatric probiotic market is just picking up and I wouldn’t be surprised if
Nestle had a few more tricks up its sleeve.